by Jay Lake
She tried the next door. Also locked.
She placed her hand flat upon the door and pushed, testing its sturdiness. She’d dislocate a shoulder on this door. And she didn’t want to waste a bullet on the deadbolt. Not to mention the attention the noise would draw. She retraced her steps next, checking each window until she found one with open curtains.
She stretched onto the tips of her toes and squinted into the dark room, her eyes picking out the shapes of bunk beds and wall lockers arranged barracks-style.
The beds were empty.
That bastard’s already sent them. Two by two, George had told her. Enough to fit into a car or a boat heading up or down river. Portland and Seattle were in close reach, and there they could swap cars and pick their next city. She envisioned a network of churches, all happy to lend cars they could later report stolen, or sold ridiculously cheap. Eventually, the young men would reach their destinations and do what they’d been trained to do.
Charity turned away from the empty barracks, tossed Frost’s keys onto the roof of his church and set out at a run for the bridge.
As she ran, she tried to use the exercise to bring her focus. She pulled her breath in at a count of four, then pushed it out, feeling the solid slap of the ground against her feet.
I’m sorry, Sandra, she thought. This one had turned on her. Another so-called bag and tag gone wrong. She felt a stab of guilt and quickly pushed it aside. Matthew had made his own choices. And she’d tried to help a friend without fully understanding what her friend’s son had been planning. This was a criminal matter now and she needed to contact Rodriguez and let her know what was happening. Fuck Hunter and her operation.
Charity ran, stretching her legs, and turned her mind to what would come next. She’d leave with George in her rental. She’d kept the tank full. It would take her less than ten minutes to throw her things into her bag and they could be in Portland at the local Edgewater office in about three hours.
It was as good a plan as any at this point.
* * *
Outside, a solitary dog barked and George jumped at the noise. His shoulder still throbbed and every noise caught his breath in his throat.
When Molly saw him trembling, she put on water and mixed him a concoction of instant coffee and instant cocoa, boiling hot and served up with four Ibuprofens. He held the old ceramic mug and sat in the corner.
“What’s going on, George?” she asked.
Something in her eyes—compassion he supposed—prompted him and he found himself laying the entire story out before her. As he did, it suddenly struck him just how far afield from his own life and experiences this had taken him and he found himself fighting tears. When they did finally leak out, the girl put a hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. “You’ve been through a lot,” she said.
He nodded. “I surely have.” And out of all the events of the last three days, the one thing that stood out most for him was that look in Frost’s eyes just before Charity hit him with the board. He’d seen rage there mingled with something dark and insane.
Something capable of killing.
Maybe, he thought, a religion founded upon the principle of shedding blood in exchange for life was destined to breed that level of crazy. If the God you worshiped was willing to kill to make His point, why wouldn’t you be willing to do the same? He shook the thought away, foreign and frightening. “I just don’t get it,” he said. “Billy and I were friends. We preached the streets together in seminary. I don’t understand how things could go so differently—so wrongly—for him.”
Molly’s voice was low and soothing. “People change. Mix in a sense of being disenfranchised with a bit of religious zeal and it can be pretty toxic.”
He nodded.
She said nothing for a minute and he realized that her hand hadn’t moved. It felt good there, reassuring. And even though there was nothing sexual about it, he still blushed. It was more familiarity with a woman than he’d experienced these last thirty years or so.
Molly continued. “These rural areas are riddled with pockets of discontented, angry people who feel trapped in poverty and cut off from the mainstream. The urban will for rural subsidy vanished during the economic collapses. Not even the reform years could help the shrinking tax base and without the natural resource industry to support them, towns like Cathlamet are awash with bitter citizens longing for change. Add a little ‘pie in the sky by and by’ to that and … voila.”
George could see it. Was it Marx who’d said religion was the opiate of the masses? He realized it may well be in some instances.
But in others, it’s a lit match to the kindling of discontent and anger.
Molly moved her hand when his shaking stopped and she sat beside him as he slipped the hot beverage. After maybe an hour, he heard three light taps at the door and Molly went to it quickly to let Charity in.
The woman was dressed now in a plain navy blue dress. She carried a suitcase as she closed the door behind her, working the lock. The pocket on the right side of her open raincoat bulged where she no doubt kept Frost’s pistol. George found himself admiring the strength he saw there. Her eyes were hard and level, moving over the room with practiced care, and her posture and jawline were confidently set. “My truck’s in front of the bed and breakfast,” she said. “We’ll hit the highway, find a signal and call Hunter, then head for Longview.”
He felt relief flooding him. He looked at Molly. “Are you packed, too?”
She shook her head. “I’m not going. I have work here to do.”
He blinked. “But Frost has people coming for you. They want you out of town.”
She shrugged. “Not everyone gets what they want.”
George looked at Charity. “You tell her.”
Charity shook her head. “She’s her own woman, George.” He watched her pull a pair of glasses from her purse—expensive, top shelf ones like the glasses Hunter and her partner wore. She passed them over to him. “Wear these. If you get a signal, call Hunter.”
He took the glasses and put them on, rolling his eyes to synchronize them. Nothing but white light and white noise. He set them to search for a signal and turned down the glare. Then, he looked at Molly.
She smiled at him. “I’ll be fine, George.”
He wanted to believe her and he marveled at the faith on her face. No, he realized, not faith but confidence. He hugged her briefly and then joined Charity by the door.
“It’s the gray Ford across the street,” she told him before looking to Molly again. “Are you sure about this?”
The girl nodded. “I am.”
Then, she held open the door with one hand as her other slipped into her pocket. George moved through the door first and she caught up quickly, her eyes scanning a main street dimly lit by dirty streetlamps spread too far apart.
They reached the Ford and she tossed her suitcase in the back. He climbed into the cab and buckled in, glancing across the street again. George sighed and Charity looked at him.
“She’s a tough one,” she said. “And I’m willing to bet Hunter and her team aren’t far away.”
“I hope you’re right.”
There was something profound about the girl that he struggled to name. Beyond her earnestness she was … good. She knew something true in a real sense. What he’d felt, when he started his road to the pulpit to many years ago, had seemed true but it was more of a hope or a wish. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have felt the need to defend it so strongly and conserve its values so strictly.
He turned his thoughts away from Molly and toward Charity. He wondered what her story was. She didn’t talk much and worked with a matter-of-fact precision that marked her as a professional. And though now she looked the part of a conservative woman with a Bible tucked in her purse, he’d seen her in action. He suspected she was military of some kind.
She started the truck and they moved away from the curb, building speed as they headed uphill past the hardware store to the highway. The road was emp
ty and wet and he saw no traffic even out on what used to be State Route 4 and was now just the called Longview-Wahkiakum Road. But as they turned right and headed east, a lone pair of headlights approached and a van sped by. It was full of men and painted white.
George saw the black letters stenciled above its cab as it flashed past. Wahkiakum Bible Temple. He craned his neck to look behind him and when he looked back to Charity, he saw she was watching the rearview mirror as well, biting her lip.
Thirty seconds passed.
“Fuck,” she said.
“Fuck,” he agreed.
George grabbed for the dashboard when she braked suddenly and pulled into the parking lot of an abandoned gas station to flip the truck around. Accelerating, she put them back on the highway, heading swiftly west.
* * *
The church van sat empty outside the pharmacy, its side door still open, as Charity approached. The door to the pharmacy was open, too, and the lights were on.
She slowed the truck and pulled it to the side of the road about a block away, casting a sidelong look to George as she handed him the keys. “Stay here. Stay low. Honk if there’s trouble.” She waited for his nod before climbing out of the cab.
She walked quickly but quietly toward the pharmacy, her ears straining at the conversation she heard inside.
“I don’t think you understand, Miss,” she heard one voice say. “We’re not here to ask.”
Molly’s response was too quiet for her to pick out the words, but her tone was confident and unafraid. She’d have labeled the girl naive if she hadn’t seen her in action, working the people with more skill than Charity had seen in most officers. Even under pressure, the girl was a leader-in-charge.
She paused outside the door and quickly counted the heads she could see. Three from her vantage point, not counting the man who spoke. Slipping her hand into her pocket, she curled her fingers around the butt of the pistol.
When she walked in, she finished her head count even as she opened her mouth. Six men. “Is there a problem here, Molly?”
The girl’s posture was calm but she saw a momentary flicker of relief in her eyes. She started to talk but the oldest of the men—a sandy-haired man in his thirties—spoke over her. “We’re just having a conversation,” he said. “You can go about your business.”
She smiled. “It’s four o’clock in the morning and I see six young men with a girl backed into a corner. I’d say this is my business.”
The man turned on her. “And who are you?”
She drew the revolver and pointed it at his chest. “I’m an armed citizen,” she said, “who’s thinking perhaps you and your boys here should be going about your own business.”
His face turned red. “We’re on the Lord’s business.”
Charity glanced at the wide-eyed faces around her. None of these young men were the caliber of trained soldiers she’d seen earlier, now sent out to scatter their seeds of violence. These were just members of the local Bullies for Christ chapter.
Except for their spokesman. She could see violence in his eyes and a calculating quality that she recognized. Still, smite the shepherd and scatter the flock.
“So what you’re telling me is that the Lord has you out at this ungodly hour harassing this solitary woman on her own property with a gang of well-dressed thugs?” She didn’t wait for him to answer. “I think you should all be moving along.”
The man sneered at her. “There are six of us and you’re just a girl with a gun,” he said. “The worst you can do is send one or two of us to Glory.”
“I’m a woman with a gun,” she said, “who’s served two tours in Iran and one in Honduras. I’ve participated in police actions in Nigeria and Pakistan.” She waved the pistol. “And you’re the only one I’d need to send anywhere.”
The sudden honking of the truck’s horn outside shifted her attention for just a moment and the man surged forward, raising his hands. She didn’t even blink. She squeezed the trigger and put a bullet in his right thigh. He fell to the side, cutting loose with a string of profanity.
She watched the other faces go white. All but Molly’s. The girl continued to exude calm. “You boys can leave now,” Charity said.
“Help me up,” the man she’d shot demanded, but when he moved, she cocked the pistol and shook her head.
“Your friend stays.”
Not a word was said. As they crowded their way through the door, she looked beyond them at the mud-spattered SUV that pulled up behind the van. She closed the door and locked it, hoping George was doing what he was told and staying out of sight.
Then, she moved over to the man she’d shot. “And who might you be?” When he didn’t immediately answer, she kicked his wounded thigh. “Answer up, Altar Boy.”
“Pastor Steve Wilkes,” he said, gritting his teeth against the pain.
She knew the name and smiled. “Things are going to get ugly in a minute,” she said. “It’ll go easier for you if you tell me where Matthew Rodriguez is going.”
His initial look was surprise but she watched him cover it over with something more resolute and less easy to read. “I don’t know any Matthew Rodriguez.”
There was hammering at the door now, and shouting. She kicked the man’s leg again and when he swatted at her, she hit him alongside the head with the barrel of the .38. “Of course you know who he is, Steve. Thou shalt not bear false witness.”
His face was purple now with rage. “You fucking bitch,” he said. “You have no idea what kind of holy wrath you’re bringing down upon yourself.”
“I don’t believe in holy wrath,” Charity said. And then she hit him again. She looked around the room, saw the duct tape, and nodded to it. “Help me out here, Molly. Tape our boy up.”
She counted the minutes that passed. A pistol fired, even indoors, was certain to be heard. And the commotion outside at this hour would wake someone up. The sheriff’s office was just down the street.
They’re not coming. And she doubted it was budgetary constraints that kept them away. They were looking the other way, letting the town’s real law enforcement take care of local business.
Good, she thought. I can use that to my advantage.
The door was cracking at the hinges as something or someone heavy fell against it. Charity divided her focus between that and the girl working the roll of tape. “Just his hands,” she said, then as an afterthought: “And his mouth.”
The door was going to give soon and she needed to be out the back with her prisoner when it did. If there was going to be a firefight two blocks from the sheriff’s office, she wanted the citizens of Cathlamet to hear it and see it.
She hauled Wilkes up by a bicep. The tape muffled his cry as he forced weight onto his leg. Without being asked, Molly came to his other side and gripped that arm.
They shuffled toward the back room and were halfway there when the front door caved in.
Despite the slur, she knew the voice she heard next, telling her to stop. More familiar than that was the sound of Frost’s pump action Remington as he chambered a shell.
* * *
George heard the gunshot and found himself fumbling for the door handle, a panic rising in him before he remembered what Charity had told him.
He saw the SUV approaching next and it all seemed to unwind like a slow-motion action sequence. As it pulled into the parking lot behind the van, the door to the pharmacy opened and five men came tumbling out before the door slammed shut again behind them. Three older men climbed out of the SUV, all holding rifles, and George’s mouth fell open.
Frost was already barking orders and the larger of the men grabbed up an old cylindrical public ashtray and used it to batter the door. Frost and the others huddled with the young men, talking in low tones.
The conversation was brief and Frost’s companion took two of the boys around back. Billy and the other three stood by and watched the door as it cracked and groaned.
George felt that panic rising again but
this time, it was accompanied by focus and one clear need.
I have to do something. He looked around the cab for some kind of weapon, then looked at the keys in his hand. He slipped into the driver’s seat, buckled the seatbelt, and glanced around the street as he inserted the key. Then, before turning it over, he took the brake off.
The door fell in and Frost moved in with his shotgun raised, shouting for Charity to stop.
George fired up the engine and floored the accelerator, hauling the wheel to the right and jumping the truck onto the sidewalk. He pointed its nose at the door where Frost and his men gathered and forced his eyes wide open to watch as they turned and tried to get clear.
Two of the younger men were just barely fast enough. One was clipped and thrown into the front of the van. Frost flew backwards into the pharmacy, his shotgun discharging as it clattered to the floor. The man with the ashtray threw it up into the air as the driver’s side bumper pushed him into the exterior wall with a crunching noise that George could hear over the roar of the engine and the man’s sudden, piercing scream.
The air went out of George as the seatbelt caught his forward movement, wrenching his wounded shoulder. Everything was gray for a moment and then he was free of his seatbelt and sliding from the passenger door to scramble over the smoking hood of the truck.
Frost was stirring when George kicked him back down. He aimed for the shoulder but got the preacher’s face instead.
He didn’t feel bad about it.
Charity already held the shotgun and George felt a moment of inadequacy when she turned to Molly. “Do you know how to use this?” she asked.
The girl shook her head. “I can’t. I’m a pacifist.”
Charity scowled and turned to George. Before she asked, he snatched the shotgun from her hand. “I used to hunt ducks with my Dad,” he said. He looked down at his former friend’s broken nose, the blood running into his mouth as he gasped for air. “And I reckon I’m not much of a pacifist at the moment.”
Then, for the first time, he noticed Steve Wilkes. The man was lying on the floor, bound and gagged with duct tape and his leg bleeding. His eyes were still cold and for a moment, he wanted to kick him in the face, too. George held his breath and then slowly released it.